Whether you are new to the Wolfhome Markets or are a senior of them, it's always good to keep in mind certain elements that help to make transactions stress free and successful. Because of this, we have published a simple guide on things to look for when looking to make a transaction with another user. Hopefully this will help guide you smoothly through the process, whether you are commissioning someone, trading with them, or receiving free services or art from them. If you do not look into the following there is a chance that in the future it could come back to prove difficult to handle. For example, if you buy a character without paying attention to the artist's ToS, you may find yourself in a tricky situation down the road when you try to rehome the character if the initial agreement was that you may not.

Thoroughly Read ToS's
A ToS, or Terms of Service, is a set of guidelines created by an artist to protect their work. Doing your research and thoroughly reading over an artist's ToS is extremely important if you are looking to commission or buy something from them because these terms will dictate what you may and may not do with the work later down the road. No matter how unfair a ToS may seem to you, keep in mind that it is your conscious decision to agree to these pre-made terms when you complete a transaction under them. Wolfhome respects artists' ToS's a great amount, and failure to abide by the terms in the future could lead to a warning or ban against your account.

Always look for the artist's ToS before you complete your purchase. If it is not stated in the topic that the sale is taking place in, search the artist in the Artist Terms of Service Forum to find the ToS applicable to your prospective purchase. Each artist, if they are creating sales topics, is required to have a ToS, and though it is not something the Administration actively pursues, we would appreciate it if you could bring it to our attention if a user does not have a ToS. Only ToS's that cover the date that the transaction took place on are applicable to the transaction. For example, if you buy a character from a user under one ToS, that is the only ToS that applies to your purchase even if they change it ten minutes after the purchase. The posts in the Artists Terms of Service Forum are locked, which means they cannot be edited. This ensures that you are not being treated unfairly by someone you are doing business with in the case that they try to edit already agreed to terms. Another thing to keep in mind is that only ToS's posted on Wolfhome are applicable to Wolfhome transactions. Offsite ToS's do not always display the date and time they are posted, so it is unfair to take action on a transaction under an offsite ToS when we are not sure that ToS applied to that specific transaction. Even if they do display it, they may be editable, and are therefore still impermissible.

That said, it is also good to keep in mind that only the original creator of a piece of artwork or a character may apply their ToS to that creation. The only exception to this is if the original creator gave someone else permission to apply their own terms to the creation. If a user does try to claim that they have special terms over someone else's creation, we will require proof of that permission before we consider it legitimate.

Research the Artist
Giving artists the benefit of the doubt is not a bad thing to do, but researching their past work and how they have conducted business with prior customers will help give you an idea of what you are getting into. To find these things out, you may look several places:
- Their past commission topics.
You can easily search for a user's past commission topics by going to the Search tool at the top right of the forum. If you search under Wolfhome Markets by author and choose to list topics, it will display a list of topics they have created and posted in. You can look through their topics to see if any customers have bumped it for updates, to view the general turnaround time the artist has, and to look at the product of the commission among other things.

- Their The Wolfhome Artist Review Document.
The Wolfhome Artist Review Document is home to posts which give positive feedback on transactions made with artists. They are usually created by the artist's customers and can lend valuable information if the artist has one. If they do not have one, you can always contact past customers of the artist.

- Artists Beware.
While it is not something that Wolfhome users may use often, if you are looking through this topic for general advice on how to go about transactions you may want to take note of Artists Beware. They have both positive and negative reviews which are processed by their staff. This means that the reviews are 100% legitimate and will give you unbiased factual information on past transactions with an artist or customer.

- Their art topics.
Most of the time an artist will display only their most impressive works as examples in their commission topics. This may become misleading because the artist has only a strong suit with elements of those specific commissions or had a better than usual run in with art that day. Try looking for their art topic in The Art Gallery so that you can get a broader scope of their capabilities. A lot of users have these in their signatures as well as their other galleries such as Fur Affinity, deviantART, and Weasyl. Searching through art topics is also a good way to find new artists to work with in the future.

Transactions Gone Bad
Unfortunately the online art market is a place where things can go wrong very easily. The Art Review Team does their best to ensure that in the end each party receives what they agreed to. If you have a situation where you feel like you have been mistreated (such as being owed art, not receiving payment, commission results not being comparable to examples, etc.) in a transaction please contact an ART member and they will do their best to help you. When contacting them, however, we ask that you provide explicit details and proof of the transaction and the terms provided. This includes, but is not limited to, the following:
- proof of payment
- proof of product completed (if applicable)
- the date range of the transaction
- the ToS applicable to the transaction
- proof of attempted contact between yourself and the other party

Your report will be processed and researched by the ART. If you do not supply enough information, they may come back and request more information or proof which will prolong the process and push back the resolution. Each report is inspected individually and the turnaround time for a decision to be reached may take awhile depending on the situation. For example, we ask that you wait at least six months before filing a report against a user who owes you artwork and will request proof of contact.

If you have any specific questions regarding transactions or how to go about them, please feel free to contact a member of the Art Review Team. They will do their very best to help you and to answer your questions.